God's presence gives meaning to human history, Pope tells audience

“What illuminates and gives full meaning to the history of the world and man begins to shine in the cave of Bethlehem,” Pope Benedict XVI told his public audience on December 12. The Pontiff continued: “It is the mystery that we will soon contemplate at Christmas: Salvation which is realized in Jesus Christ.”

The Pope devoted his weekly audience to a discussion of how God reveals himself to mankind. History, he said is “the arena where we see what God does for humanity.” The Pope said that all human history can be seen in the context of God’s “loving dialogue with man,” which “gives new meaning to the entire human journey.”

To understand the steps of this journey, the Pontiff suggested that believers should read the Bible. There, he remarked, they will find Exodus as “the central historical event in which God reveals the power of his action” to the people of Israel. The phases of God’s revelation continue through the Incarnation, he continued. “The Magnificat, which the Virgin Mary raises to God, is one of the highest examples of the history of salvation.”

Pope Benedict suggested that during Advent, the faithful contemplate these steps of revelation as they await their culmination at Bethlehem. “Advent invites us to retrace this path and reminds us again the God has not left this world.”

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